Simma Kularatna - Interact - LinkedIn Has Lost the Plot - Can the CX Community Fix It?

If you send out a request, odds are you're gonna get an acceptance.

But then if you try to engage with them, just to reach out and say, "Hi, I'm interested in your business, um, I, I'd like to learn more," they just don't answer.

There's no reply.

Or if they do reply, then it's i- i- it's almost confrontational, like, "Are you trying to sell me something?" Or, "Don't bother if you're trying to sell me something." Uh, Mark, you and I both know, as people that have built our businesses on the back of LinkedIn and the CX community, this is a problem.

And I think with Simma, she was able to encapsulate a lot of the different challenges that so many of us are facing now as we're looking to try and expand our networks and, and get to know other people and get to know different businesses that maybe haven't been previous on our radar.

But what I really enjoy about this interview with Simma is the fact that she does give some ideas about what we collectively can do to reengage with LinkedIn, what we can do to reengage with people that perhaps we've been connected with for some time and we want to get to know more, or people that maybe we haven't connected with yet, but again, that we'd like to, to find out a little bit more about.

So a great discussion with...

Simma's one of these people I can sit down with and- Three hours go by, it seems like five minutes.

She's fascinating.

She's got so many different opinions, but she's positive, and I think this is what we need on LinkedIn now.

And we've done a couple of episodes around LinkedIn, some of the challenges that we face.

This is truly, I think, some remedies and some, uh, antidotes in terms of what's been plaguing different aspects of the network over the last while.

Yeah, I think it's useful to get, um, this sort of positive message, you know, uh, what is the antidote to, to this, rather than just, just having a rant because, because, you know, everybody is talking about how bad LinkedIn is at the moment.

Um, it's flooded with AI-generated content.

Um, everybody feels overwhelmed because their timeline has got so much stuff on it.

And now, um, LinkedIn has chosen to start doing suggested content, so you get lots of people who are not in your network also on your timeline as well, because it...

they think that you might be interested in this stuff.

And so, you know, there, there's that sense of being overwhelmed as well as, um, having to filter through to the actual nuggets of real information rather than the AI-generated stuff.

So, so, you know, we certainly need to, to, um, interact in a more positive way with this network.

Otherwise, you know, w- what's to stop Google or, um, Meta coming up with an alternative business network?

That's a very valid question.

Now, to date, we've not heard anything about anything like that.

I also have some skepticism, even if, uh, there was an alternative network that was gonna pop up, how effective it would be.

Look, we all remember when Blue Sky started, we all remember when Threads started, and they really went nowhere, which is unfortunate, because we've, we've truly got, I, I don't know if you'd call it a monopoly or an oligopoly when it comes to different social networks, but there, there has to be something that's going to do- to be done to redress it.

And a trend that I've noticed that I actually find very worrying is when you do reach out to somebody now, they might n- they might actually come back to you and say, "Why did you connect with me? What's the purpose in this connection?" I mean, that, that's, that's beyond passive-aggressive.

If you send out a request, odds are you're gonna get an acceptance.

But then if you try to engage with them, just to reach out and say, "Hi, I'm interested in your business, um, I, I'd like to learn more," they just don't answer.

There's no reply.

Or if they do reply, then it's i- i- it's almost confrontational, like, "Are you trying to sell me something?" Or, "Don't bother if you're trying to sell me something." Uh, Mark, you and I both know, as people that have built our businesses on the back of LinkedIn and the CX community, this is a problem.

And I think with Simma, she was able to encapsulate a lot of the different challenges that so many of us are facing now as we're looking to try and expand our networks and, and get to know other people and get to know different businesses that maybe haven't been previous on our radar.

But what I really enjoy about this interview with Simma is the fact that she does give some ideas about what we collectively can do to reengage with LinkedIn, what we can do to reengage with people that perhaps we've been connected with for some time and we want to get to know more, or people that maybe we haven't connected with yet, but again, that we'd like to, to find out a little bit more about.

So a great discussion with...

Simma's one of these people I can sit down with and- Three hours go by, it seems like five minutes.

She's fascinating.

She's got so many different opinions, but she's positive, and I think this is what we need on LinkedIn now.

And we've done a couple of episodes around LinkedIn, some of the challenges that we face.

This is truly, I think, some remedies and some, uh, antidotes in terms of what's been plaguing different aspects of the network over the last while.

Yeah, I think it's useful to get, um, this sort of positive message, you know, uh, what is the antidote to, to this, rather than just, just having a rant because, because, you know, everybody is talking about how bad LinkedIn is at the moment.

Um, it's flooded with AI-generated content.

Um, everybody feels overwhelmed because their timeline has got so much stuff on it.

And now, um, LinkedIn has chosen to start doing suggested content, so you get lots of people who are not in your network also on your timeline as well, because it...

they think that you might be interested in this stuff.

And so, you know, there, there's that sense of being overwhelmed as well as, um, having to filter through to the actual nuggets of real information rather than the AI-generated stuff.

So, so, you know, we certainly need to, to, um, interact in a more positive way with this network.

Otherwise, you know, w- what's to stop Google or, um, Meta coming up with an alternative business network?

That's a very valid question.

Now, to date, we've not heard anything about anything like that.

I also have some skepticism, even if, uh, there was an alternative network that was gonna pop up, how effective it would be.

Look, we all remember when Blue Sky started, we all remember when Threads started, and they really went nowhere, which is unfortunate, because we've, we've truly got, I, I don't know if you'd call it a monopoly or an oligopoly when it comes to different social networks, but there, there has to be something that's going to do- to be done to redress it.

And a trend that I've noticed that I actually find very worrying is when you do reach out to somebody now, they might n- they might actually come back to you and say, "Why did you connect with me? What's the purpose in this connection?" I mean, that, that's, that's beyond passive-aggressive.